BellaOnline Forums Education Astronomy Carl Sagan Day

Three cheers for the life of the astronomer and superb science communicator Carl Sagan! Monday is Carl Sagan Day - he was born on November 9, 1934. His influence is still so much with us it's difficult to believe that he died 19 years ago. Many of today's professional and amateur astronomers were first inspired by Carl Sagan.

Good ways to celebrate: read one of Sagan's books, watch a DVD of his Cosmos series.

Carl Sagan helped to design the plaques on Pioneer 10 and 11, and also the Voyagers - the Golden Records.

Carl Sagan persuaded NASA to have Voyager 1 take a family portrait of the planets of the Solar System as it headed into the Kuiper Belt. From this came the pixel that contained Earth and was christened "the pale blue dot".

Carl Sagan's contemplation of the pixel that contained Earth in Voyager's image of the Solar System is moving and thoughtful. Here is the voice of Sagan himself reading the pale blue dot.

There are many interpretations of Carl Sagan's "pale blue dot" - my favorite is the graphical one by Zen Pencils, the talented and thoughtful Australian cartoonist Gavin Aung Than.

Have a look at his adaptation of the Pale Blue Dot. (When it loads, just click on it to get it to readable size.)